Chinese Lawsuit Seeks Return of Virtual Weapons

Howzer writes "In breaking news from behind the Great Firewall of China, an online gamer is suing JC Entertainment to force them to restore all of his Redmoon 'biological weapons' (his words) and compensate him for emotional damage. Some heavy hitters are lining up on both sides, as it appears the gamer has already had at least one day in court and may have several more. Now, this isn't the world's first by any means, but it's China's first, and China's fledgeling legal system often favours the little guy against big, faceless multinationals, especially when the law isn't clear. And if he wins, it will certainly put a dent in the fastest growing online gaming market on the planet." We've previously covered the early stages of this lawsuit.

Comments

Hmm...

[setzman]

The article doesn't say how SHUILIU0011 stole the items. Did the guy use a decent password on his account, or was it some kind of crack that the thief used? However, you'd think they have some method of restoring the items if he could prove they were stolen by another user.

No economic value?

[nodwick]

Zhang Qingsong explains that these "weapons", or points, represent a right that the player can get to a certain level and play with a certain degree of ease or excitement. Even though they may have economic value among players, current law does not specify its legality.

If the Gaming Open Market (reported in an earlier story) takes off, then they'll be able to prove exactly how much economic value lost items have.

I think people are starting to recognize that the time and effort (not to mention subscription dollars) that go into the levelling treadmill for MMORPGs means that your resulting character and items do have economic value, just like if you'd spent the time building model sailboats or writing software code. Whether it should be enough of a basis for suing people I don't know, but companies should put more of an effort into security for MMORPGs than just to say, "Ho hum, guess we got hacked again. Let's just reboot and pretend it didn't happen. Good thing our EULA denies all liability!"

Re:No economic value?

[HRbnjR]

I agree with the parent. If there is a dent in the gaming market because of this lawsuit, I hope it will be the dropout of companies that aren't capable of looking after their users rights (at least, what will become rights if this guy wins)

Re:No economic value?

[sugus]

Putting time and effort into something doesnt necessarily give it value. If I happen to find a lump of gold in my garden tomorrow morning - that requires no effort, but is surely more valuable than me investing hours into some game to buy some "weapons".

But that's not to say these items arent without economic value. Don't forget what economics is all about: supply and demand. If the demand is there, how could it NOT have value?

Re:No economic value?

[darkmayo]

Economic value to whom?
Certainly not the rest of the world who don't play these games. Keep this crap out of the courts unless the game itself was hacked, but then you would be charged with being a hacker and not making Eulric The Uber lose his "Warhammer +20 x30 to goats"

Re:No economic value?

[Anonymous Coward]

Just because something doesn't hold the same (or any) value to you as it does to someone else doesn't mean it doesn't have economic value. It's the whole basis of what makes the world go round and prices fluxuate and such.

One person says they'll buy X item for $10 while another will pay $30 and another won't pay more than $5 while another doesn't need X item and won't pay anything.

Whether or not a game company says "X virtual has no economic value" is pretty pompus IMHO. That's like saying, "No, you don't want to give real cash to that seller for that magical sword" to all those thousands of people doing virutal item trades for real money every day. If a person values an item enough to put a cash value on it, I can't see how you can really stop them from buying it. It's like telling people what they can and can't do with their money for no reason whatsoever, especially since there are currently no laws in place to tell the person they CAN'T buy/sell something like that.

Re:No economic value?

[darkmayo]

if the items hold no value for those outside of the system then why have an outside system deal with the conflicts in this internal system.

have the game company create there own laws and systems for dealing with these problems, alot of this crap falls under the EULA for these games, lets keep it to the company who creates this stuff.. Its there world, not reality, therefore problems need to be adressed by the world creators.

Baa

[antin]

I think I hear the sheep calling...

Re:Baa

[antin]

Dudes how can a comment be overrated if it was never rated? Either mod offtopic, or flamebait or whatever - but overrated?

Re:Baa

[Carnildo]

Dudes how can a comment be overrated if it was never rated?

Um, because the poster rated the comment important enough to post?

TROLL!!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

China's fledgeling legal system often favours the little guy against big, faceless multinationals, especially when the law isn't clear.

If this isn't a disguised anti-american troll then I don't know better...

whatever

[DrunkClam]

too bad the american legal system is so oppressive. What do you want, the gamer to get a $15,000 fine from the RIAA?

Correction

[BigChigger]

" China's fledgeling legal system often favours the little guy against big, faceless multinationals". Make that against American multinationals. They don't favor their own very much when they're enslaved by Chinese companies. BC

China is a huge market

[MonkeyCookie]

And if he wins, it will certainly put a dent in the fastest growing online gaming market on the planet.

Even if he won, I can't imagine that it would scare off the online gaming industry. China is a huge market and companies see a potential for some major profit when looking at China. If online gaming becomes as popular in China as it is in Korea, then online gaming companies will be rolling in money regardless of lawsuits.

Greed conquers all fears

EULA makes for an interesting read

[jay!!!]

Take a quick peek at Redmoon's "Rules of Conduct":

http://www.redmoon-europe.com/support/eula.php


Li was certainly inconvienced (rule 2) and his gameplay disrupted (rule 7) either through a hack or a game bug (rules 19 and 20 respectively). As mentioned in the acticle, he apparently has given false information reguarding his name (rule 15), but even if he wanted to make a correction or accusation, he is refused the opportunity to make real name statements (rule 17).

I like how the defense claims Li "cannot prove there was such a virtual larceny". Such a statement nearly guaruntees that the onus of proof will fall on JC Entertainment's shoulders: They control the physical systems that house the digital assets. They have backups that can be restored and verified.

Could you imagine going into a police station:

Li: "Hi I was mugged by that fellow over there and I can see that he still has my wallet."
Police: "That very distinct, and rare wallet?"
L: "Yes, and I would like it back."
P: "How do I know that you didn't just give it to him?"
L: ?
P: "Oh oh oh! It appears that the theif is wearing a t-shirt that says 'I cannot be arrested', so there is really very little we can do for you..."

- Jay!!!

Another lawsuit that should come...

[Anonymous Coward]

Saddam Hussein really should sue the UN for letting Monkey W. Bush steal his biological weapons. Not to mention also sueing Dubya in the international courts for his war crimes.